


The Stress of Her Regard

by TheWheelWithinTheWheel



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: And a little bit of Horror, But that 'pig' line had to come from somewhere right?, F/M, God love him, High School AU, In which Joyce is a big-mouthed brazen little badass, It IS Halloween after all peeps, Jopper Smut, and Hop is a big ol' teenage jerk, lots of swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-22
Updated: 2017-10-22
Packaged: 2019-01-21 14:45:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12459969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheWheelWithinTheWheel/pseuds/TheWheelWithinTheWheel
Summary: “Once upon a time, Joyce Tamblyn was utterly fearless. Or so she was determined that everyone around her believe.”Flashbacks to the autumn of ’58 explore the strange and unusual events that sparked Joyce’s decades-long battle with anxiety, and finally answer just WHAT caused the breakdown of her relationship with Hopper. One-shot.





	The Stress of Her Regard

Once upon a time, Joyce Tamblyn was utterly fearless. Or so she was determined that everyone around her believe.

Despite her Grandma Ada’s nigh exhaustive attempts to rear her into a proper, respectable young lady, at sixteen years of age Joyce discovered she rather enjoyed picking fights with pretty much ANYBODY who deigned to look at her funny (as the shiner she’d ended up sporting after tackling a thoroughly unprepared Chrissy Carpenter in Gym Class could attest). Ada would sigh as she patted concealer all over her granddaughter’s left eye, rambling on and on in old Finnish about what her parents would have thought of her rude, unladylike behavior if they’d still been alive, and how no decent young man would EVER want to marry someone so ‘feisty’ and ‘uncontrollable’.

But Joyce would just smirk and mentally congratulate herself, confident in the knowledge that when she walked into school the next morning, it would be to the begrudging respect of the rest of her fellow classmates. They may not actually _like_ her per se, may gossip-monger behind her back and even agree with Grandma Ada that she’d NEVER be married with that wild temper of hers. But they’d never again mistake her for some simpering little bubble-headed cheerleader type whose whole life revolved around planning for her wedding day. Even if she _was_ dating the captain of the football team.

Her boyfriend since 7th Grade, “Big Jim” Hopper (a nickname he’d bequeathed  _himself_ after scoring the Hawkins’ Houndogs’ first win against Pawnee High, but one Joyce absolutely refused to use anywhere but the backseat of his Dad’s ‘47 Oldsmobile), certainly didn’t help matters much. As much as he enjoyed getting into her pants, Big Jim _also_ delighted in pressing Joyce’s buttons whenever and however he could, a pastime made all the more appealing considering Joyce would NEVER back down from a dare, no matter how frivolous or even _outrageous_ said dare might be.

Last Halloween for instance: a bored suggestion on Hop’s part during Hawkin’s High’s lame-as-balls masquerade party had found Joyce perched precariously atop his shoulders not half an hour later, sawing the head off the school’s prized bronze statue of its founder, some Fancy-Pants McStalworth or whatever the hell the old moneybags had been called whike he was still alive. They _might_ have gotten caught too if Hop hadn’t had the good sense to keep his Dad’s Oldsmobile running while they did the dirty deed, allowing them a quick getaway before Principal Strucker could chase them down and force them to remove their masks.    

That was the great thing about Hop though: he was ALWAYS her accomplice, her veritable ‘partner in crime’ as it were, and would follow her anywhere, no matter what trouble might lie in store for the both of them for all their teenage tomfoolery.

All of which explains what happened that very strange evening the 25th of October, 1958, in the typically sleepy, boring-as-all-hell town of Hawkins, Indiana. The evening that would in many ways alter the course of young Joyce’s life forever.

***

“ _Dammit Hop, I’m going to throttle the living daylights out of_ _you_!” Joyce whispered to herself furiously as she barreled down the street in her freshly-shined Mary Janes, sure to receive a tardy slip the second she arrived at school, as she’d wasted a good twenty minutes waiting around for her useless pig of a boyfriend to pick her up. _If_   he’d actually bothered to remember she’d be kicking back in a nice warm Oldsmobile right about now, not plowing against the brisk and biting wind, her pink poodle skirt blowing every which way and effectively exposing her scantily-stockinged legs to the cruel October chill.

As her hands and feet turned to ice the only relief Joyce could find was the litany of curse words she repeated to herself over and over again, reciting the perfect order with which to toss them at Hop the second she ran into him. She’d wipe the smirk right off that smug face of his once she slapped it and told him to go jack off into a sock, because if he thought he was going to lure her behind the trashcans outside the cafeteria during lunch again, he had another thing coming.

Just then a car horn blared loudly from behind her. “Well whaddya know. ‘Bout damn time you showed up, assho-” Turning her head sharply, Joyce was half-way through bellowing out the insult when she realized it was _not_ Jim Hopper in his Dad’s ’47 Oldsmobile who had been beeping her after all, but rather one Lonnie Byers rolling down the street in a run-down, fire-engine red pick-up truck.

“Hey Tamblyn!” he shouted at her through the cranked-down driver’s side window. “You must be freezing out there. Wanna ride?”

“Yes, _please_!” Joyce knew damn well Hop would lose his MIND when he saw her pulling into the school parking lot with Lonnie Byers, the boy who’d pursued her _relentlessly_ despite her steady status with Hop since 7 th grade. But Joyce’s fingers were numb and watching Hop turn green with envy when they arrived at Hawkins High was just the cherry on top of the shit cake she was going to serve when she saw him.

Besides, Lonnie Byers was kinda cute. Certainly not in the buffed up, athletic way Hopper was, but there was a certain swarthy quality to the boy Joyce couldn’t help but find somewhat attractive.

Not that she’d ever act on it, of course.

“I’m surprised Big Jim didn’t drive you today.” Joyce had barely gotten her seatbelt buckled before Lonnie took advantage of the situation to make his ‘rival’ look like a tool. Joyce smirked, not fooled by the faux-innocent look of surprise on his face for a second, but very much in the mood to vent anyhow.

“Yeah it seems Ol’ Hop forgot about me today. Big jerk.”

Lonnie snorted in the seat next to her. “I always said you could do better than him, Tamblyn.”

His companion shook her head, chestnut curls bouncing up and down where they framed the sides of her pale, pretty face. “Like YOU maybe Byers?”

“Well why not?” Lonnie turned back to her then with a raised eyebrow. “I have a good job at the hardware store and I come from a pretty respectable family. You could do a lot worse.”

Joyce shrugged. “I’ve already told you a million times you’re not my type, Lon.”

“How can you know that for sure unless you go out with me?”

Joyce sighed and rolled her eyes heavily. “Byers if this is your way of getting me to go to the Halloween Dance with you tonight, you can forget it. _I don’t do dancing_.”

“Pshhh I’m not going to that corny shindig; that’s for squares. Besides, I already have plans for tonight. Something WAY more exciting than some boring old square dance. A few of my buddies and I are gonna go check out the old MacIver Place ‘round midnight tonight. See if the rumors are true after all.”

“The MacIver Place?” Joyce shifted sharply where she sat to stare at him incredulously. “You mean that run-down old cabin off Cornwallis and Kerley? The one the old folks all swear is haunted?”

“ _That’s_ the one.”

“Oooooh spoooooky!” Joyce reached over and poked him playfully in the chest.  “Gonna try and catch some moldy old ghoul on camera, Byers?”

“Maybe,” he replied with a devlish grin. “Wanna tag along?”

Joyce hesitated. Rumors had swirled around the MacIver Place and what may or may not be lurking inside it for well over twenty years. Ever since all five members of one of Hawkins’ oldest families, the MacIvers, had packed up in the middle of the night back in the early ‘30s, disappearing to God only knew where without so much as a ‘goodbye’ to anyone else around the town. Friends and neighbors had poked around the place afterwards and supposedly reported loud wailing noises, lights turning on and off all by themselves, and strange claw marks in the nursery that looked too big to have been made by a wolf, or even a bear.

The dark legends surrounding the place quickly grew to such an extent that NOBODY would dare purchase it, no matter how cheap the local realtor finally ended up having to slash down the asking price after five long years of it languishing on the market.

As the years passed and the cabin fell into such disrepair as to make it unsalvageable, the local police department had squared the place off with some of their trademark flimsy yellow tape and a big fat ‘CONDEMNED’ sign stamped on the partially collapsed front door. But of course that never stopped any of the bored teenagers around town from breaking into the place every Halloween season, looking for a thrill and a story to tell. And every year a pack of kids would walk into school with a brand new yarn to share, some more outrageous than others (“Why would a ghost have tree-branches for arms, Kelly?” Joyce had inquired of a particularly ashen Kelly Dubois last Nov the 1st. Kelly hadn’t taken particularly kindly to the inquiry).

Many of the more close-minded denizens of the town had just staved it all off as tall tales. The ramblings of some attention-seeking kids looking to get their names in the papers by producing the most outlandish story possible. Hopper in particular enjoyed making fun of anyone who came back from an outing to the old place SWEARING they’d caught a glimpse of something with large yellow eyes and pointy fingers lingering around the nursery. But Grandma Ada had always taught Joyce that there was much more to life than that which could be touched, felt, or seen, so for all her guffawing at the supposed “attention-seekers” for Hop’s benefit, Joyce couldn’t help but wonder if there was something more to the stories than wild exaggerations…

“What’s a matter, Tamblyn? All of a sudden you’re a _fraidy-cat_?”

Joyce was snapped out of her reverie by the last word, sorely tempted now to reach over and deck Byers right through the driver’s side window. _Nobody_ called her a fraidy-cat.

Luckily for her and Lonnie both, Joyce was spared the need to retaliate by her _finally_ useful boyfriend, for not five seconds after Byers had pulled the pick-up truck just outside the front entrance to the school, Hopper was on her car side door, whipping it open and offering his arm for her to climb down.

“Morning, Joycie,” He placed a very obvious kiss on her forehead once she’d finally made it out of the truck, making a show of cuddling her close to his side and nuzzling her hair just for Lonnie. Joyce all the while simply rolled her eyes, not in the mood for this blatant display of male territorialism so early in the morning. _Why didn’t he just pee on her leg and get it over with?_

Lonnie at least seemed to take the hint. “See ya around, Tamblyn.” He waved her off briefly before barreling through the double doors to his Homeroom, expression sour and hands flexing back and forth into fists at his side.

“What the hell was that all about?” Hop rounded on her as soon as Lonnie was out of earshot, anger and envy etched all over his chiseled features. Joyce heaved out a long sigh.

“Calm down, Jimbo, we didn’t get engaged for God’s sakes! He was just giving me a ride, since SOMEBODY forgot to pick me up _like they fucking promised they would last night_!” She capped off the last word by tweaking the boy beside her hard on the nose. Hopper swallowed thickly as he began to rub at the reddening tip.

“Yeah Joycie about that… look I’m real sorry. I _was_ on my way to your place, but then Coach called and I got sidetracked going over some new plays for practice later today. It’s not my fault.”

“Oh no, _of course it’s not_ ,” Joyce bit out at him sourly. “It never _is_ , is it? Please, save your excuses for someone who cares, Hop. I know I don’t.”

She tore herself away from him roughly then, heading toward the school entrance and not giving her beau so much as a cursory look back. Joyce had just reached out to shove her way through the black-framed double doors when a big, beefy hand wrapped itself around her arm, yanking her roughly into a patch of particularly thick bushes on the right side of the entrance-way. A scorching hot mouth met hers before she could protest, and Hopper did what he always had done best, no matter how mad she was at him at the time, and kissed her to utter, perfect, _heavenly_ distraction.

“Mmmm,” Joyce found herself moaning like a wanton little thing in his mouth, _hating_ this mesmerizing effect he could have on her body, how it made her give into him and all his whiles so damn easily, no matter what boorish thing he might have said or done to her that day. 

“Come on now, Joycie,” Hopper broke the kiss to lean his forehead against hers, big blue puppy-dog eyes staring down into her enflamed brown ones. “What’s Big Jim got to do to make you forgive me, huh?”

“Ummm,” Joyce tried and failed to think up some smart-aleck reply, too distracted by the feel of Hopper’s hands roaming shamelessly up and down her breasts through her snow white cardigan. 

“I bet I know what you’d like.” He reached both hands under her skirt now, slowly folding down her pale pink panties until they pooled at her Mary Janes.

“ _Oh, fuck._ ” Joyce was more than a little aroused now, and barely hesitated before unzipping Hop’s midnight blue dungarees and grabbing his already-hardened cock between her newly frozen hand, a sensation which elicited a brief gasp and then a slow, guttural moan from the back of her boyfriend’s throat.

“Fuck, Joycie.” His lips crashed down onto hers once more as she guided his throbbing member inside her aching cunt. Wrapping his tree trunk-like arms around her waist, he pushed her softly up against the brick masonry directly behind their bush, and, thrusting into her over and over again so fucking hard, it was all Joyce could do not to scream for the whole damn school behind them to hear.

“Hop, Hop baby I can’t-"

He placed a helping hand across her lips to stifle her increasingly emphatic moans, all the while tempering his own exclamations of pleasure into a series of harsh grunts in her ear.

Another couple of minutes later and Joyce found her entire body melting around his throbbing cock, Hop himself exploding in pure pleasure not all that much longer afterwards. They both just stood there wrapped around each other for a good long minute, not willing to relinquish each other to the cruel October chill just yet. Unfortunately as Joyce’s senses slowly but surely returned to her, so did her sour temper.

“That was really nice, Hop. _Almost_ as nice as back in Byers’ pick-up truck, but not quite.”

Hop’s lusty eyes immediately grew enraged. “What?!”

Joyce snorted. “ _Relax_ Hop, I was just kidding.”

She pushed him away sharply to bend down to the cobblestone pavement and yank up her panties back into the folds of her skirt, Hopper himself working fast to readjust himself inside his form-fitting Levis beside her.

“Am I really supposed to believe Byers didn’t put the moves on you before?” Jim grilled her through narrowed eyes as he absent-mindedly fastened the bronze belt buckle of his jeans in three expert moves.

“If you call inviting me to some haunted old house in the middle of the woods ‘putting on the moves’, then yeah. Super duper romantic.”

“Wait, what? What haunted house?”

“The old MacIver Place. The one in the woods off Cornwallis and Kerley.”

“Did you say you’d go with him?” He raised an accusatory eyebrow at her then. Joyce bit out a sharp laugh.

“ _No, Hop_. I can spot a ploy to get me alone in a big empty house when I see one. Now if you’re done with the Spanish Inquisition, I really need to get to class. Strucker’s bound to slap me with five tardy slips already as it is.”

***

Much to Joyce’s relief and delight, First Period ended up passing her by relatively quickly. Of course, this was mainly due to the fact that she spent most of Geometry, English, and Home Ec with her forehead plastered dead-center on her desktop, happily engaged in the world of REM (who REALLY needed to know any of that boring junk anyhow?). As soon as the bell rang for lunch Hop kicked her right leg hard beneath her desk from the seat beside her, and a groggy Joyce grabbed her book bag off the floor before stumbling slightly as she followed her beau out to Hawkins High’s cafeteria.

As they prepared to dig into their Thursday Surprise (which Joyce was pretty sure was just yesterday’s meatloaf mixed in with some week-old mac and cheese), Byers and his two best pals, Lloyd and Frankie Dunn, passed right by their table on the far left corner of the lunch hall, Lonnie shooting her a less-than-subtle wink as he nicked an apple slice from the side of her plate. She returned his attentions with a small smile of her own, successfully prompting Hopper to pout even more sullenly beside her (if it were possible).

“Guess you’re meeting up with your new boyfriend tonight after all, huh?”

“Hop shut up. You’re acting like a tool.”

Joyce took a long swig from her little yellow bottle of chocolate milk when the round moony face of a young blond boy appeared over the rim.

“H-hey guys, mind if I sit here today? Everywhere else is full.”

“Of course Bobby,” Joyce replied to the anxious boy with a warm smile. “You can sit with us whenever you like.”

Little Bobby Newby was sweet and shy and woefully underappreciated by their fellow students at Hawkins High, who by and large showed him as much regard as a paperweight on Principal Strucker’s desk. All except for Joyce, who for reasons she _herself_ couldn’t quite define always felt compelled to be super nice to him.

“Say Bobby, is that a new haircut?” Joyce reached over and swept a hand across Bobby’s roughly chopped yellow locks. “Looks great on you. Really brings out your dimples.”

Bobby blushed furiously as Joyce’s compliments sank in, while Hopper’s expression grew increasingly sour by the second. “Careful now, Joycie. Wouldn’t want your new boyfriend over there to hear you flirting with little Bobby over here.”

Joyce rounded on him almost instantly. “I’m just trying to be friendly you stupid asshole.” But the insult just ended up fueling Hopper’s flames even more.

“Or maybe that’s what you’re going for, aye Joycie? Get all us boys fighting over you at the same damn time. Say, maybe you should invite Bobby over here to the MacIver Place with you and ol’ Lonnie tonight. Whoever lasts long enough in a house full of spooks might just have the cajones to put up with you as a wife one day.”

“Oh for God’s sake Hop!” Joyce exclaimed with an exasperated ‘bang’ of her fist on the cafeteria table. “ _I never agreed to go up there!_ Believe it or not I’ve never wanted to upset you _that much_.”

“Yeah, of course you didn’t.” Hopper snorted at her assertion incredulously.

“What’s _that_ supposed to mean?”

“Oh please Joycie, you’ve never given a shit about pissing me off a day in your life. You’re just _scared_.”

If looks could kill, Hop would have dropped dead on the spot. “I am NOT scared Hop,” Joyce asserted in a furious whisper that was _almost_ a growl. “I’m not scared of _anything_ , got it?”

“Ohhhh but you _really don’t want to go up there Joyce_ ,” Bobby finally chimed in again, his face ashen as he shook his head vigorously back and forth, eyes wide and round like saucers. “ _Trust me._ A lot of freaky stuff happens near that house. My Dad used to tell me about these awful moans he and his camping buddies would hear whenever they pitched their tent around there. Like something being _tortured_.”

Joyce tried her damndest to fight the shudder creeping up the length of her spine, but Hop apparently picked up on it anyway. “Don’t worry, Bobby. No way we’re gonna get her up there. She’ll only take on things she can whack with a fist.”

That was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

“Fine then,” she turned her full attention back to Hopper now. “Let’s meet up with Byers and his pals around midnight tonight. Take a spin through that house and see if the rumors are really true after all.”

“Ohhhh so suddenly _I’m_ invited to your little date night with dearest darlingest Lonnie, huh?” Hopper folded his arms and raised his eyebrows at her goadingly.

“Well you wanna act like some big strong tough guy in comparison to poor little old me. Put your moxie where your mouth is, bub.”

Hopper stared her down for a long, hard moment then, but finally smirked. “Alright, Joycie. _I’m in_.”

***

Later that evening, as the town square clock tower tolled three long blares of the bell to signify midnight, Joyce and her beau pulled up quietly on the corner of Cornwallis and Kerley, eyes darting up and down the street to make sure no lingering cops looking for a catch could be found hiding in the shadows. Grabbing a pair of flashlights from the back seat of the Oldsmobile, the duo began their lengthy trudge through the dank dark wood, the freshly fallen leaves crunching loudly beneath their feet with each and every last step they took within,

“Boy I never realized just how far back in here the MacIver Place actually is. Guess those old hermits really liked their privacy huh?” Joyce mumbled absent-mindedly as she shined a light through a particularly thick patch of bramble on her right, squinting to see if she could make out an outline of a house but not being able to discern anything but the twisted shadows of even more trees swaying to and fro in the darkness.  

“Don’t tell me you want to turn back _already_ , Joycie.” Hopper taunted her with a disapproving shake of the head. Joyce narrowed her eyes at him briefly before sticking her middle finger up where he couldn’t miss it even _with_ the lack of daylight.

“ _No Hop_ , just making an observation is all. Fucking butthead.”

They continued the rest of their journey in silence then, the trek feeling interminable even if it really was only a few minutes according to Hopper’s shiny silver chronograph watch. For a brief moment, Joyce was sorely tempted to suggest they _do_ turn back after all, it apparently being too damn dark to find the stupid, moldy old house in such a thick patch of woods after all, when a new voice rang out sharply through the crisp autumn air from somewhere to their left.

“Tamblyn! You showed after all!” The sound of Randy Kort sneakers demolishing a rather noisy mixture of twigs and leaves beneath them soon followed, and the swarthy face of Lonnie Byers appeared from between two particularly tall beeches, grinning out at Joyce like a blooming idiot all the while. “I _told_ the other guys you had the guts to—” He stopped abruptly at the sight of Joyce’s beau beside her, his eyes narrowing as if he’d just stepped in an especially thick pile of grizzly bear feces. “Oh. _Hello Hopper_. Didn’t realize you were coming too.”

Hopper smirked smugly at his rival. “Where Joyce goes, _I_ go. _Always_ _have, always will_.” Joyce found herself blushing furiously at her beau’s declaration of devotion, her heart melting in a giant puddle inside her chest in spite of herself. For all their incessant bickering, pressing each other’s buttons and general ribbing of each other for sport, Joyce had little doubt that Hopper was truly, madly, _deeply_ in love with her. Maybe that’s why she was so determined to show him she could hold her own in any situation. _She’d hate for him to think she was anything less than his equal._

Lonnie’s previously buoyant mood meanwhile had rapidly turned sulky. But to his credit he managed to suck it up fairly quickly. “ _Alrighty then_. Why don’t we go meet up with Lloyd and Frank? They’re already waiting out by the porch.”

Joyce and Hopper followed Lonnie through a nearby cluster of half-rotted maples when the outline of a small log cabin _finally_ emerged out of the ever-crushing darkness. As they drew closer to the front porch, Joyce noticed that Frank and Lloyd had already made quick work vandalizing the old place with what looked like a dozen rolls of toilet paper she was fairly certain they’d nicked from the local General Store.

“Real mature, boys. You’re parents must be SO proud.”

Frank merely chuckled at her little barb. “Just having a little bit of fun, Tamblyn. Besides, not like anyone’s around here to mind.”

Joyce was going to retort with something clever about ‘if someone acts like a moron out in the woods and nobody’s around to see it, they’re _still_ a moron”, when a loud scraping sound from somewhere behind them interrupted her train of thought. Five pairs of flashlights spun around on a dime to illuminate the exact same spot roughly ten feet away.

“W-who’s there?” The edge in Lonnie’s voice echoed out in thick waves through the rickety wood.

Another long scrape of rubber tires against bramble and upturned dirt and the round, moony face of Bobby Newby emerged through the wood atop a shiny purple Schwinn.

“Hey guys. Hope I’m not late.”

“ _Bobby_?” Joyce wasted little time sprinting up to the boy as he climbed down off his bike. “Bobby what are you _doing_ out here? I thought you said this place freaked you out?”

Bobby blushed so hard it was easily visible to Joyce in the dark, his eyes turning downcast to the pile of rotted leaves beneath his feet. “ _It does, Joyce._ But you’re my friend… _that’s_ why I had to come. To make sure you’d be okay.”

Joyce felt her insides light up for the second time that night. Pulling the boy into a tight embrace, she reached over briefly to whisper warmly in his ear, “You’re a _real_ sweetheart, Bobby Newby. I hope you know that,” before planting a quick little peck on his right ruddy cheek.

“This is really just wonderfully, _sickeningly_ sweet and all that, but can we actually go _inside_ the damn house while my clothes are still in style?” Hopper prompted sharply from behind them, arms folded and left foot tapping up and down on the ground impatiently. Joyce pulled herself away from Bobby then, an adorably goofy grinned plastered on his now thoroughly-scarlet face.

“Yes, shall we?” Lonnie offered his arm out to Joyce as she approached the run-down old porch, but she just snorted and trudged onward past him, not buying his show of faux-chivalry for a second.

Joyce narrowed her eyes in distaste at the dilapidated old door just barely hanging onto its very last hinge at the top left corner, pushing through and marveling that the half-rotted slab of mahogany hadn’t come crashing down on her at the slightest touch. As she made her way further into the house the disturbingly soggy floorboards began creaking and groaning loudly beneath her tennis shoes, and the cacophony only increased as the rest of her party followed closely behind.

Shining their flashlights all around the decades-old parlor, it quickly became clear that time had _not_ been particularly kind to the MacIver house, if it had been kind at all. Whatever furniture wasn’t completely smothered in dust and cobweb was run-down and waterlogged. Half the boards making up the back interior of the house appeared to have been gnawed at in different places by wild animals stopping by the abandoned place for a treat. And the nasty smell that pervaded the entire space let Joyce know at _least_ one of said animals had died fairly recently shortly after their meal.

“Boy what a dump.” She observed flatly while stepping over something she desperately hoped was just a worn-out old floor rug.

“Twenty years with no upkeep will do that to ya,” Hopper concurred from somewhere to her right. “Just look at old Mrs. Hansen on Lake Street.”

Joyce tried and failed to stifle a small chuckle at that as she continued to lead the group further and further into the cabin. She had just made out the outline of a short hallway across from what she could only assume had once served as the MacIver’s kitchen, when a large ‘yelping’ sound bleated out through the silence.

“What the hell was that?!” Lloyd practically jumped out of his skin and into Frank’s tree-trunk like arms next to Joyce.

“Probably just some animal,” Lonnie replied much more calmly, but a distinct edge of _doubt_ now permeated in his voice.

“Guys please let’s just go!” Bobby choked out in a small sob from behind them. “I don’t like this one bit. This is exactly like the stories my Dad used to tell me!”

“Geez Newby, grow some balls why don’t ya.”

Joyce smacked her boyfriend hard in the chest. “ _Be nice, Hop_.”

Despite all of their better judgments the teens continued on forward until they made their way to the hallway, a narrow little strip that broke out into three doors each on their left and right. Lonnie all the way kept snapping photos every few seconds, his camera pointed here, there, everywhere in case there was some spot of the house he’d accidentally missed.

“Wanna split up?” He suggested while curiously eyeing a half-open door on the left. We each take a room and then all meet up in whichever one nobody picked?”

“Sounds like a plan to me,” Hopper agreed, wasting no time before making his way toward the closest door on his right. “Joycie?”

Joyce swallowed thickly before nodding her agreement. “Alright, I’ll take this one.” She marched up to a large wooden door with most of its paint peeled off and, nudging it open slowly, shined her light in a quick flurry around the dank little room to make sure she didn’t end up running into some foraging animal (or worse). From what she could see it appeared entirely empty though, so she continued on in with a small sigh of relief, leaving the door wide-open behind her for good measure.

As she trekked on further into the little room she quickly realized that, once upon a time, it must have been used as the MacIver children’s nursery. A pair of dilapidated old cribs lined the furthest corner of the room, spider webs criss-crossing interminably through the half-eaten wooden bars. Broken-down toys and dolls lay strewn across the floor like fallen leaves in the wood. Joyce bent down slowly to reach for a small, porcelain ballerina in a periwinkle tutu lying on its side by her feet.

Just as her fingers began to brush the pale blue fabric enveloping the bottom half of the doll, a sharp creaking noise from behind made her whip around sharply.

“Wha-” She shone her flashlight on the door frame, Bobby’s face peeking in at her apologetically from the outside.

“S-sorry Joyce.” The boy edged into the room shyly, careful not to accidentally brush the door shut behind him as he shuffled past.

“Bobby what are you doing here?” Joyce inquired with a slight tilt of her head. “Why aren’t you checking out one of the other rooms?”

“I-I was,” Bobby insisted with a sharp nod. “But it was just a broom closet. Nothing funny going on in there. Besides I…I wanted to make sure you were okay,” he admitted with a sweet smile. Joyce suddenly found herself unable to look him in the eye anymore.

“Well it doesn’t look like there’s anything in here, either,” she piped up again after a few seconds of awkward silence. “Not unless you like playing with babydolls.” She turned back toward the ballerina still resting long-untouched by her feet, when a strange shape in the corner of her eye made her whip around sharply, turning the flashlight to the right-hand corner of the back-most wall. It looked like…claw marks.

“Whoa, Bobby, are you seeing these?” She moved a little bit closer then, examining the marks through narrowed, slightly startled eyes. They _might_ have appeared to look just like the scratches your average raccoon would make skittering from wall to wall, if the markings themselves weren’t about ten times the size of your average raccoon, and the edges weren’t strangely jagged, as if someone had carved them with a dull knife. _Or something else._

“I guess the rumors were true after all,” Bobby finally piped up after another long minute with an audible gulp. “About strange marks in the nursery I mean. Not the ghosts. I hope anyhow,” his eyes darted back and forth sharply as if something might jump out at them any minute.

As if Bobby had tempted fate, a large _SLAM!_ echoed directly from behind them, making the two jump slightly where they stood, a slight yelp emanating from the back of Joyce’s throat in spite of herself.

Joyce quickly whipped her flashlight back around to the door, which (just as she feared) now stood firmly shut behind them. She darted for it as her pulse quickened rapidly, yanking on it hard, only to find it now tightly locked shut.

“Shit!” Joyce swore loudly as she began pounding on the moldy old wood with both fists. “Guys! We’re locked in here! Let us out!”

On the other side of the door her shouts for help were met with the booming, _taunting_ laugh of one Big Jim Hopper.

“ _Real funny, Hop!_ ” Joyce bellowed back at him as she continued banging hard on the door, swearing to slap him silly the second she got her hands on the stupid cock. “ _You let us out of here right now!_ ”

“Awwww, but don’t you and little Bobby want some _alone time_ together?” He mocked her now in a mirthless sing-song voice through the keyhole. “I think you both deserve your ‘seven minutes in heaven’,  don’t you?”

“Fucking prick!” Joyce pummeled the door one last time before turning back to her companion, his eyes wide and frightened as he stood rooted to the spot. “Don’t worry Bobby, Hop’s just being a jerk, as usual, don’t pay him any mi-”

But her reassurances were stolen from her mouth mid-sentence, for suddenly Joyce and Bobby were most decidedly _not_ the only occupants of the MacIvers’ long-abandoned nursery.

“B-B-Bobby… _do you see it_?” The words finally spilled out in icy bursts of wind from between her trembling lips.

Bobby just stared at her, eyes now the size of saucers and face as pale as the full moon. “S-see what Joyce?”

But his friend couldn’t answer that, not knowing or comprehending just what the _hell_ stood towering in the corner across from them by the claw marks. She could only point.

_Point to where those glowing yellow eyes were gazing fixedly at her… Eyes like the headlights of a car struggling to pierce through a thick mist._

“I don’t see anything, Joyce.” Bobby stared and stared _and stared_ but whatever it was that had manifested itself so clearly to her had eluded him somehow. “What do you see?”

Suddenly Joyce’s legs gave out sharply beneath her. She dropped with a loud ‘thud’ to the floor, her flashlight slipping from her hand and rolling all the way across to the other side of the room. Bobby was at her side in an instant.

“Joyce! Joyce talk to me!” He tried lifting her limp form from the ground from where it lay collapsed atop the now shattered ballerina, but she wouldn’t budge an inch, eyes transfixed by the unnaturally _spindly_ creature slowly inching its way toward them. A creature with branch-like arms protruding from what could only be described as a tall, thin, tree trunk-like body, upon which a large, emerald green mantle lay draped like a cloak.

“Joyce?! Bobby?!” Suddenly Hopper’s voice rang out once more from the other side of the door. “What’s all that shouting about? What’s going on in there?”

“Jim something’s wrong with her! S-she’s seeing something in here but I don’t know what it is. Let us out!”

Joyce heard the doorknob shake like an angry rattlesnake somewhere behind her, but apparently the door had fused itself shut sometime in the last couple of minutes.

“Shit! I-I can’t get it open guys, I’m sorry!” Hopper finally exclaimed after several long seconds wrestling furiously with the knob, voice sounding genuinely contrite, for once. “I’ll get the other guys to help me break it down, _just hang on!_ ”

Tears began to spill in a small flood onto Joyce’s cheeks as the creature now hovered directly at Bobby’s side, a deep rasping sound echoing from somewhere in the folds of the shimmery cloak. _Not sweet, innocent, heroic Bobby Newby._

“B-Bobby,” she somehow managed to eek out in a terrified voice. “ _Bobby it’s right behind you_.”

Bobby spun around sharply, his breath coming out in terrified bursts and his body trembling where he stood from head to toe. He peered all around, raking his light over every last corner of the nursery, but apparently could still see nothing out of the ordinary. “Joyce you gotta talk to me,” he ran a hand exasperatedly through his thick, golden hair. “ _What are you seeing?_ ”

Joyce managed to claw her way up the wall behind her until she was back on her feet again, legs wobbling wildly like jelly but standing firm beneath her.

“You leave him alone,” she whispered at the thing through furious sobs, determined to keep its attention on her and away from her now-thoroughly confused companion.

“W-what? What are you talking about Joyce?”

She let out a long, slow moan as a branch-like arm began to emerge from out of the folds of its giant green cloak. “Bobby please get away from it!”

“Guys stand away from the door!” Lonnie’s voice shot out from the other side of the wall at them then. “ _We’re about to break it down now, just keep out of the way!_ ”

“Lonnie hurry!” Joyce turned her head sharply toward the door, finally regaining the proper use of her voice. “ _There’s something in here with us Lonnie!_ ”  

And then it was towering right in front of her, the foul stench of its rasping breath washing all over her in thick, icy jets.

Joyce felt frozen from head to toe, the cold permeating inside her very chest and bones. _Inside her very heart._

Branch-like hands were weaving themselves into her chestnut curls now, and Joyce’s ears were aching from the sound of her own screams as whatever this monstrosity was drew her in even closer to itself, forcing her head up sharply until all she could see were those two unblinking points of light blaring out at her in the darkness. But suddenly the yellow blare faded, replaced by a slew of new images flashing through her brain she barely had time to process, let alone make out exactly what they were.

_She saw a small, pale, frightened little girl pounding against a broom closet door, begging for her Papa to come let her out… she saw a half-asleep boy shivering from head to foot in what looked like a make-shift tent, whispering to himself through chattering teeth as the flap began to stretch itself open behind him…_

SMASH!

“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” Joyce and Bobby both shrieked as an ax came barreling sharply through the door, chopping furiously and erratically at the wooden barrier between them.

“I’m coming, Joyce!” Lonnie reassured her through the hole he just made in the right half of door before proceeding to chop a second one on the left.

“Hurry Lonnie, _hurry_!” Joyce moaned as she turned to look back at where the strange Tree creature had been, but seeing nothing but playthings and baby clothes now.

Another few seconds later and Lonnie was barreling through the wooden scraps of the door, scooping Joyce up in his arms and carrying her out of the room, whispering over and over again that she was okay, he was here now, nothing was going to hurt her. She was just on the verge of passing out in his arms when he set her down gently on a chair in the outer hall. It was all she could do not to bury her head beneath the cushions and scream until no more sound would come out.

***

The rest of that night was a complete blur to Joyce. She vaguely remembered Lonnie wrapping her up in his denim overshirt as she sat there shivering like mad on the moth-eaten sofa (she’d slapped Hop’s team jacket to the floor when he attempted to put it on her). Somebody drove her to the emergency clinic in the town square, and there was Bobby’s soothing voice echoing out in the darkness of her mind: “It’s alright Joyce…you’re outta there, you’re safe now, _you’re going to be just fine._ ”

But she _wasn’t_ just fine. For the next two weeks she was far too petrified to even consider leaving her room, let alone do normal things like attend school or go to the mall or even run to the grocery store for a pack of Camels. Every small bump or creak around the house made her scream and duck behind the couch, trembling from head to foot. And sleep was out of the question—sleep meant another visit with glowing yellow eyes and tree branch-like fingers and visions of children being tortured by something merciless in the dark.

After about a month her Grandma Ada finally decided she couldn’t take little Joycie’s antics anymore, slapped her hard across the face and yelled at her in Finnish to ‘snap the hell out of it’. But of course it wasn’t as simple as all that. Fear isn’t something you can turn on and off like a light switch, she tried to explain to her Grandma over and over again as calmly and rationally as she knew how. But when ‘calm’ wouldn’t work locked doors and refusals to eat were resorted to. Another three weeks later and she didn’t even bother getting out of bed in the mornings, no matter how hard or how long Grandma Ada stood pounding at the door.

Eventually a ‘specialist’ from all the way out in Evansville was called in to speak with her, some greasy bald man in thick, horn-rimmed glasses who tells her over and over again that what she saw was an adrenaline-fueled hallucination, nothing more. He drills it into her skull so many times over the next two months that Joyce eventually comes to believe him, forces herself to accept that the strange tree creature with glowing yellow eyes was just a trick of the imagination, for after all, why hadn’t little Bobby Newby seen it too, if it wasn’t, right? Why hadn’t Lonnie caught a picture or two of it with his camera, if it’d really been in the house with them after all?

_Right?_

But despite what she had decided she now believed, _must_ believe, if she was going to survive, going to make her way back out into the world, there was no undoing all the damage that’d been wrought. Joyce Tamblyn, the former night owl, the girl who never backed down from anyone or let anything stand in the way of a good time, now _dreaded_ going out after sunset, flatly refusing any kindly-offered party invitation or suggestion for a evening on the town whenever they floated by her. She fidgeted tensely under the watchful eyes of Hawkins’ other residents, not minding their morbid curiosity as much as the way it reminded her of the unblinking stare of what she’d seen, no, _thought_ she’d seen at that dreadful old house.

And she couldn’t find it in her to forgive Hopper, even if he stopped by her grandma’s house _every single day_ , throwing rocks at her window, desperately seeking her out for what she could only assume was to apologize. To try and work that old ‘Big Jim’ charm on her, as if some sweet talk and a quick poke in a bush could make up for everything she’d gone through thanks to him and his carelessness.

For the first two weeks she just ignored him, stuffing her head under a pillow and screaming like a banshee into the mattress to block out the steady _Rap! Rap!_ rapping sound of the pebbles against the glass. Another week later and she _finally_ showed up at the window, staring at him coldly, refusing to acknowledge just how much he looked like a sad, lost little puppy trying to find his human. She reached out to the blind-cord and snapped the curtains shut, hoping he’d get the message and just leave her the hell alone. But even then, Hopper’s devotion wasn’t so easily shaken.

“Joycie!” She hadn’t been back inside the school for ten minutes after three long months absent before her former beau was on her tail like white on rice.

“Come on now Joycie, you gotta talk to me. You know I didn’t mean for any of it to happen—”

“Leave me alone, Hop.” She turned to walk away, not in the mood to stare at his pleading face another second.

“Joycie, _please_.”

“ _No!_ “ She practically shrieked it in his face, finally unloading all the pain and anger that’d been swirling around inside her since that awful, awful night. “I have had ENOUGH of your fucking bullshit, you selfish little _pig_!” She shoved him hard into Georgie Pierce’s locker then, his head bouncing awkwardly against the cold hard metal, but he didn’t even make a sound, and Joyce couldn’t be bothered to care whether she’d given him a concussion or not. “We are DONE you stupid asshole! Do you understand me?! Fucking DONE!”

She stomped off then without another word, mascara running down her cheeks in thick black pools as she sobbed the entire way to her Home Room, collapsing against the wall just outside the classroom door and crying her big brown eyes out into her tiny pale hands.

“Tamblyn?” She heard Byers’ voice call out to her a few minutes later, unnaturally timid and sad for him. He slid onto the spot on the floor next to hers as she continued to sob uncontrollably, wrapping an arm around her heaving shoulders and pulling her up tight against his chest.

“Oh honey I’m so sorry, this is all my fault. I don’t even know what I was thinking, asking you up there in the first place. _Please forgive me, I’m so so sorry._ ”

Joyce finally raised her head from its resting place against her palms, red, puffy eyes boring into the crinkled, guilt-ridden ones of the boy beside her. He opened his mouth to apologize one more time, but couldn’t get the words out before Joyce had grabbed his pale, pointed face between her trembling fingers, roughly pushing his mouth down to her own.

Whether it was several seconds or minutes into their kiss, Joyce couldn’t be sure, but at some point a sharp intake of breath a few feet away would bring an end to their special moment, as she and Lonnie swiftly broke apart to find a shell-shocked Jim Hopper staring at them with wide, befuddled, _heartbroken_ eyes. Joyce paused for a moment, something faint and distant stirring painfully inside her chest, but after a few more seconds she found herself smirking mercilessly at the crestfallen boy down the hall, reveling in the pain she could inspire in him as though it might eventually make her feel like fearless, cocky ol’ Joyce Tamblyn again.

 _It wouldn’t of course._ But what does anyone really understand about the way people work at a mere sixteen years of age?

Without so much as another word, Joyce grabbed Lonnie’s hand in her own and stalked off to the school parking lot, planning to hide out in his pick-up truck (and maybe do more than _hide_ ) until lunch. Hop in turn would comfort himself in the days to come by screwing Chrissy Carpenter in the back of his Dad’s Oldsmobile and making sure the whole school heard about it, but Joyce couldn’t even be bothered to care.

She gradually threw herself more and more into the arms and whims of Lonnie Byers, mapping out a far happier little future for herself playing house with him and whatever children they might eventually have. A future she knew deep down inside herself could never truly last, in the same place she knew that what she had seen at the old MacIver house couldn’t really be chalked up to pure imagination.

_But what does anyone really understand about the way people work at a mere sixteen years of age?_

***

Sometimes, even now, after putting Will to sleep and settling into her queen-size bed with a large glass of discount wine she’d picked up at the General Store, Joyce finds herself dreaming of misty glowing eyes and branch-like fingers reaching out to her in the darkness. The other images she caught sight of in the pale yellow eyes had mostly faded away over time, but occasionally she catches glimpses of them here and there in her nightmares, and there’s something uncomfortably familiar about the boy lying cold, scared, and all alone in that tent…

She wakes up screaming her head off until her first-born son comes barreling into the room, wrapping her up in his arms and rocking her back and forth on top of the mattress. All the while assuring her everything's going to be okay, _Jonathan’s here, he’s got her, he’s not going to let anything bad happen_. When she’s calmed down enough he tries to coax her into explaining what her nightmares had been about, insisting she’ll feel better if she talks about them, _if she_ _faces them head on_.

Joyce smiles sadly and tells him they were all about a girl she used to know. _A girl who died twenty-four long, long years ago._

 

**Author's Note:**

> My first attempt at a one-shot guys (or any Halloween-themed fic in general). Let me know what you think in the comments, pretty please.
> 
> Also, just in case anybody's interested, I based my Creature loosely off of the Flatwoods Monster, specifically this particular rendering of it: https://crovirus.deviantart.com/art/Flatwoods-Alien-442805691. Special thanks to Crovirus over at DeviantArt for the nifty visual, it helped me out A LOT. 
> 
> And a quick note for the readers of my other, multi-chaptered ST fic: yes, I realize it's been roughly a month since I've updated, no I haven't decided to leave you all hanging interminably. I'm hard at work on the next installment as we speak, and boy, is it gonna be a DOOZY! *waggles eyebrows*


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